Following up on our conversation on separating the personal and the political in the abortion debate, the following is a guest post by a progressive Christian pastor who draws on the biblical tradition to show how restrictive abortion policies disproportionately affect women already in critical situations.
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Empty Vessels
Rev. Eilidh Lowery
Early on in the scriptures we see the Hebrew people valuing life because life is important to God. God is the God of light and life, and people are made in the image of God, so the people are about life. This important value even makes the top ten list: thou shalt not kill. Of course, pretty much immediately the Hebrew people go slaughter a bunch of their enemies, but God only meant the chosen people’s life, right?
The Hebrew people were so keen on protecting life that they traced life back to it’s earliest point in order to make sure no one was dishonoring God. In early metaphysics it was pretty clear to everyone that women were just empty vessels waiting for the male seed to fill them so that they could bear children. This meant that sperm were sacred on their own as a harbinger of life itself. Poor Onan discovers in Genesis 38 that those who spill seed on the ground end up dead as their punishment for wasting life and disobeying God. I learned in seminary that all sorts of things from anal and oral sex to masturbation were taboo simply because of this notion of sperm as life. In fact some rabbis told people that they were murdering generations of children every time their seed spilt.
This is where we get the theologies that prohibit birth control. We can even draw a line from this world view to the notion that homosexuality is immoral. Lucky for us, we live in a world where we understand that sperm is only half the genetic ingredients needed to make a baby and so these sex taboos are slowly changing.
Dual Reality
So now we get to babies. Some people who are about life think that once the sperm have done their job of finding the egg that life has begun. But others ask when is a baby a baby? Is it at conception or when the heart beats or when the brain awakens or when the baby would live outside the womb? This is where the abortion debate rages. We may have moved beyond the ancient metaphysics, but we’re not clear on our own.
The heated debate on abortion is influenced by the things we know, like that the reality of advanced medical diagnosis means that some folks know months ahead of time that their child will die shortly after birth. We know about rape and incest and the failures of contraception. The cycle of poverty and unwanted pregnancy is well documented.
At the heart of all of this, for people of faith, is a dual reality:
- Folks who are trying to be faithful to their understanding of God’s love of life cannot bear the idea of ending the life of a child.
- Others who are trying to be faithful to their understanding of God’s love of life cannot bear the idea of forcing someone to have a child.
How can that be? How can the answer to valuing life be abortion?
Back to Empty Vessels?
Abortion is about justice. It’s about allowing women to make the important, personal decision about becoming a parent, or giving up a child for adoption, or having an abortion. As restrictions and new laws are put into place the ability to make a powerful, life changing choice is being taken away from the person who bears the most responsibility and consequences for the outcome of the decision.
Women are being reduced once again to an empty vessel that must put the life that might be ahead of her life and the other lives in her family. Women are fertile for about 35 years, which means a woman who wants two children will spend about 30 years of her life trying to prevent unintended pregnancy. Having 3 children instead of 2, having a child at the wrong time, having a child with the wrong person, all of this affects life from generation to generation.
The women who are most affected by the abortion debate are the women who we as Christians seek to care for the most. The bible again and again commands we care for the poor, the orphan, the widow. We honor God and life by seeking justice and equity for those that society marginalizes. Restrictions on health care have the greatest impact on low-income women, women of color, immigrant women, and survivors of domestic abuse. Studies show that a woman who seeks an abortion, but is denied, is significantly more likely to fall into poverty than a woman who is able to get an abortion.
All the factors–not just one
People who want to end abortion are motivated from a place of deep concern for our world and for the sanctity of life. People who want to protect abortion rights are motivated from a place of deep concern for our wold and for the sanctity of life. I’m proud to be part of an organization that works for all women to care for their reproductive health. NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon supports all women along every step of her reproductive journey from contraception to prenatal and postnatal care as well as abortion
This is from the NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon equity statement and captures why, as a progressive Christian, it is important to me to speak and to listen on this matter:
“The concept of reproductive justice was originally introduced in 1994 by Women of African Descent for Reproductive Justice and later developed by the SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective. Forward Together defines reproductive justice as the complete physical, mental, spiritual, political, economic, and social well-being of women and girls. It will be achieved when every person has the economic, social, and political power and resources to make healthy decisions about their bodies, sexuality, and reproduction for themselves, their families, and their communities in all areas of their lives.
Reproductive justice isn’t just about the legal right to choose. It is about all of those factors that shape and impact choice—factors like race, socio-economic status, immigration status, sexual orientation, and gender identity. Reproductive justice examines how those factors intersect with one another and affect a person’s experience accessing the full range of reproductive options. It addresses the reality that access to care looks different depending on what you look like, where you live, where you were born, where and whether you work.”
Decisions about parenthood and adoption and the end of pregnancy should be between a woman and her doctor. Those who have a theological message can speak that message and offer their opinions, because we live in a country that allows us to speak freely.
I hope you will join me in advocating for reproductive justice and ensuring that no woman is ever reduced to being less than a full person ever again. May we be about the life of all people.
Rev. Eilidh Lowery is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church. She serves a new church start and a traditional congregation in Portland, Oregon. She serves her community in many ways, including as a member of the board of NARAL Pro-Choice Oregon. She has an awesome collection of high heels.
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Thoughts?
I’m going to use a strong word in my reply below. I do not want or intend to be inflammatory or unwilling to have a reasoned debate, but I will use this word because I know no better way to express my view in English.
I have thought and prayed about abortion many times over the years, and each time I do, I come back to the same strong, compelling conclusion: abortion is murder.
I promise you I am not saying this to incite conflict, to inflict pain on those who have aborted, or with any other kind of desire to do harm. It is simply the only conclusion I feel I can draw given the information that I have about the matter.
Let me explain to two primary reasons I feel this way:
I believe that life begins at conception. A person is fully and completely human from the moment of conception.
I believe that any willful ending of a human life, except in cases of war or defense against violent attack, is murder.
Thus a fetus, fully human and incapable of war or violent attack, is able to be murdered (because of its humanity) and incapable of deserving to have its life ended.
This does not mean that I am unwilling to discuss abortion with those who feel there are times when it is acceptable or necessary, but I share these things to emphasize how profoundly difficult it is for me to see things from another perspective.
I agree completely that a woman who is in poverty will have great difficulty raising the child, and the child’s life will be very difficult. I want to escape this by ending the poverty.
I agree completely that a woman who is raped has not agreed to become a parent, and her relationship with that child may be very difficult because of that. I want to escape this by ending rape.
I know that these situations are infinitely less simple than typing out the phrase “ending rape”, but is there not some extent to which the very notion of “unwanted pregnancy” is a symptom of other problems, and not the problem itself?
Finally, I want to emphasize that, as Rev. Lowery has said, we are all coming from a place of “deep concern for our world and for the sanctity of life.” Nothing I have said is meant to defame or discredit those who sincerely believe that, used properly, abortion is able to be permissible and moral. I only want to express that, from the deepest part of my heart, I do not believe this is the case.
You are ascribing rights to an embryo that no other living person has, and you are infringing upon rights for pregnant people that even dead people are afforded. No living person has the right to use my body to sustain themselves against my will. And if I die tomorrow, no one can harvest my organs without my permission even if others will die without them. Why do you want to deny these rights to living women? Pregnancy is a profound and selfless act of courage, but doing so against your will is slavery.
Also, life begins at conception because you FEEL like it’s true? Well, isn’t that special! What about twins? You do realize that the fertilized egg doesn’t split to create a multiple for several days, right? Oh, you didn’t know that? Why am I not surprised? I guess the second twin isn’t really a person, because it wasn’t there at conception.
There is simply no anti abortion position that isn’t rooted in misogyny, even if said pro-lifers swear up and down that they just LOOOOVE women. Dig a little deeper, an you’ll find a blistering contempt for women who won’t be meek and dependent upon a man, even if that man is violent and cruel.
Claire, when does life begin? If not at conception, could you give a specific time, and your rationale for it? And do you agree that the baby shouldn’t be killed after life begins?
In Christ,
The enemy hates clarity
I think personhood develops on a continuum. Definitely not at conception, because twins in most cases will develop into two people, and yet at conception, it is only one entity, so….
I don’t think ‘when life begins’ is even a pertinent question. You don’t have the right to use another person’s body against their will, period. You don’t have the right to use a DEAD person’s body against their will. You enjoy that right as a man, why do you want to infringe upon the ability of women to enjoy it as well?
If you believe that the state has the right to commandeer a woman’s body to gestate new life against her will, than perhaps the state should require all persons without a uterus to participate in mandatory organ donations. Would you agree to this? People die without organ donations every day. What about their lives? We can all agree that they have personhood, and yet “pro-lifers” don’t seem too keen on this idea. why not? Is it because men would have to give up bodily autonomy?
That’s the problem with your premise, Andrew. You completely disregard the needs, health, welfare, dreams, and desires of the “empty vessel”.
Furthermore, I highly doubt you really believe that “life begins at conception”, or at least that your choices/activism likely does not reflect that belief. But perhaps, you could clarify what you mean by “conception”. Most pro-lifers when they say “life begins at conception”, what they mean is that life begins the moment the sperm and egg join to form a fertilized egg- what is technically called fertilization. Conception is when the fertilized egg attaches to the uterine wall, the moment the woman conceives.
If you do mean fertilization, than do you believe that a fertilized egg in a petri dish has the same moral worth as a toddler? If so, say you were driving down the road and saw a fertility clinic on fire. You do the heroic thing and run it to see if you can help. You find a vat of 1000 frozen fertilized eggs and a screaming toddler, but you only have time to bring one to safety. Are you saying the moral choice would be to grab the vat and leave the toddler to burn?
Also, are you aware that approximately 80 percent of all fertilized eggs fail to implant on their own and are flushed out of the body? If 80 percent of toddlers across the globe were dropping dead of natural causes, it would be considered the worst health crisis since the black plague. Are you as a pro-life person doing anything to help these “people”? Where are the telethons and charities to save the lives of non-viable embryos? Are they not just as precious to you and other pro-life persons as the ones that are destroyed in an abortion? Why or why not?
Also, does your community typically gather for a funeral for the contents of an early miscarriage they way you memorialize a born person who has died? If embryos are equal in worth to born persons, why don’t you do this?
I’m genuinely curious how you resolve these inconsistencies. Or, perhaps you would answer these questions in a way that I wouldn’t expect.
I don’t have much to add to what you’ve already said, Claire, but I felt compelled to say thank you. Thank you for your voice. Thank you for your courage. Thank you for your passion, and your compassion. Thank you for speaking truth to power. Thank you for not letting the privileged class’s fantasies of oppression go unchallenged. Thank you for saying what so many feel unsafe saying, and thank you for standing up for yourself and all women, even those who are complicit in their own oppression and will never thank you for your efforts on their behalf. Your efforts do not go unnoticed, and your voice does not go unheard.
Claire—Hello dear stranger! 🙂 Wishing you well in life, whoever, and wherever you are! Thanks for sharing! I say this respectfully, and I know it will be a statement which is in disagreement with yours, but I hope you can consider these points. I also wish to not make you feel badly, or attack you, but to share what I feel is very important. Yes, this is all only my opinion, but that goes without saying.
I would first like to say, that Andrew is right, and your attacks are ad hominem, sophist, straw man arguments. Abortion is murder.
One must ask, “What is a killing?”. A killing is the stealing of a living creature’s future life, and all it would entail. When a murderer kills a 5 year old child, society does not say, “Well at least they were not a six year old child yet!”. The younger the victim—the more life stolen. If a mother kills a fetus, she steals more life, than if she kills her 1 year old, and thus, killing a fetus is the ultimate infanticide. This is irrefutable.
I hope that you will consider this, because the world is mentally ill for allowing abortions. I hope you will confront this horror. I myself was pro-choice for many years, until I decided to take a deep look at life, death, homicide, matricide, patricide, sororicide, fratricide, feticide, infanticide, and to truly understand what life is, and what a killing is. What is the meaning of a killing? I asked all these things. I played devil’s advocate multiple times, arguing for the most horrific things, such as legal infanticide, and legal homicide. I found that abortion uses all the same logic and rationalizations as mentally ill serial killers, and psychotic mothers. I promise you, this is the case.
I also want people to understand, you can change your mind on this issue, even if you have had an abortion. It is okay to do so. I believe pro-choice peoples are mentally ill, and I am an agnostic. I believe you need help, and I highly recommend you see a therapist, or talk to someone who will help you to stop hurting others, by promoting the ultimate infanticide.
A killing of an infant kills, not the life they have had so far, but the life they were going to live, and this is true for all living creatures, animal or human.
Hello Andrew—I agree with you, that abortion is murder. We hear so many sophist, straw man, reductionist arguments from pro-choice peoples that it can be confusing sometimes. I have a simple explanation to explain why abortion is wrong, which I feel you will appreciate. It is secular, and irrefutable, and it is as follows:
A killing, by definition, is the stealing of an entities future life, in all of its entirety, including everything it would become—be it an inchworm, a cat, an embryo, a fetus, a human, or a microbe. The magnitude of the murder, is measured by the amount of life stollen; thus, if the average human lifespan is 80+ years, killing a 30 year old man, would steal 50+ years. Killing a fetus, would steal 80+ years. Feticide is, by definition, the ultimate infanticide, and the ultimate homicide. It is murder.
Well Andrew, how fortunate for you that you will never be in the position of struggling with this choice.
In Andrew’s defense, your comment is irrelevant, and it points to the fact father’s have no right to save their unborn child. Many men, have begged their wive’s not to kill their child, and have suffered greatly.
Consider this—A killing, by definition, is the stealing of a living entities future life, and all it will be. This is universally true, for all living humans, animals, microbes, etc. The average lifespan is 80+ years. Killing a 50 year old man robs him of 30+ years. Killing a fetus, robs that life of 80+ years. Because of this, feticide is the ultimate homicide. This is irrefutable.
The year was 1981. I was one year from graduating from college. Having been raised in the Bible Belt I was essentially a “good girl.” I even knew that God was calling me to more than just a career as a Speech Therapist.
I’d never had sex. Sure I’d come close, but all those sermons about sex outside of marriage being sinful filled my brain. Until one night. Three months later I found out I was pregnant.
My choice, during intense overwhelming panic and depression, was abortion. I truly believed that I would go to “hell.” Not only had I sinned, I had really sinned.
I had no one to talk to about this. I couldn’t tell anyone as I’d be judged and out cast. So I became an outcast in my own mind.
Life was hell. I could never forgive myself. I endured several miscarriages after marriage and believed that I was being punished.
Finally, after years of struggling, I heard a pastor preach that there was nothing I could ever do that God would not forgive. That was when I truly understood and experienced grace.
I thank God that God doesn’t judge our sin as one being worse than another. I thank God that Jesus took away the power of sin and replaced it with awesome grace. You can call what I did anything you want. But God calls it forgiven.
We should have the right to choose as women. And we shouldn’t be made to believe that we are less because of the choice. All of us come to God through a different journey path. And now God even uses me to proclaim God’s Good News of forgiveness and grace, of life and love unconditional, of hope and freedom. May we all start with this before we stand in judgment.
Rev. Lowery closes with “May we be about the life of all people.” Except the baby. A human being dies in every abortion. Why chose death?
Indeed, a killing steals the future, not the past, and this is universally true. Killing a living entity, results in the theft of the life it would have lived. This is irrefutable. Abortion, feticide, infanticide—all are homicide. They are terrible crimes. The younger the victim, the greater the crime. We have mass psychosis in America, for we allow this horror to continue. We have 100 million child murderers, walking free in America.
This is why women should not be allowed to speak while in church.
“They will know we are Christian by our misogyny”
Killing a life, kills its future, not its past; thus, one must consider how much life is stolen. This is why, abortion is the ultimate homicide. I don’t wish to attack anyone here, but I hope that those who have sinned, will be brave enough to confront their sin. I am agnostic, and abortion is homicide—period. This is fact, and it is, irrefutable. I support all those who fight for truth and the protection of children by banning abortion. Homicide is not the answer.
I say this all with love and respect, but this article is truly misguided. Abortion is murder. A killing, by definition, is the stealing of an entities future life, and all it would have entailed. This is universally true, for all animals, people, children, fetuses, creatures, and all living entities. The killing of a fetus, results in the theft of future life, not past life. It is the ultimate infanticide, and this is irrefutable. You need mental help, and you need to see a therapist (a pro-life therapist) because you are preaching homicide. Please stop hurting humanity and seek mental help. Get well soon.