Reading:
Proverbs 18:5
It
is not good to show partiality to the guilty by perverting the
justice due the innocent. (Proverbs
18:5 HCSB)
The
principle laid out in this proverb is clear. But why does this
perversion of justice continue to happen? Why are the guilty given
this partiality? Because they have power and the one showing
partiality has something to gain by their power (Proverbs 17:23). Why
are the innocent deprived of justice? Because they are weak and
powerless and have nothing to offer. (Proverbs 18:23; 19:7)
Giving
advantage to the powerful over the weak promotes and supports
oppression. Oppressors, however, love to play the victim. The
racist loves to speak about how the hated race is the real problem.
That they are only doing what they have to. The abuser frequently
blames the abused. The pattern is not unusual: the powerful blame
the weak or powerless for the harm the powerful bring upon the
powerless.
Sunday,
as I was leaving the closing rally for “40 Days for Life” it
struck me that the pro-choice movement uses the same tired
talk-track. All the ingredients are present: the powerful (the
pressuring father, the mother—sometimes the mother is also a victim
of pressures and abuse, other times she is motivated internally by
her own indulgence, the Planned Parenthood staff) and the weak and
helpless (that would be the baby in the womb who has no legal
protection, no voice, no guardian).
The
pro-choice movement
regularly cries out
how oppressive it would be to women if they could not abort their
baby at will. In other words, it would be oppressive to restrict
those with all the power in this situation (the woman) by protecting
those with no power (the baby). The baby must pay
the price for mom's freedom. The weak must pay the price for the powerful.
The pro-choice crowd loves to cry
accusations about a “war on women” toward anyone pro-life.
This is like accusing abolitionists of a war on white people, or
accusing those who fight domestic violence of a war on men... as if
all men are abusers.
Even
Jesse Jackson could once see this pattern of the oppressor playing
the victim in the pro-choice movement.
"There
are those who argue that the right to privacy is of higher order than
the right to life...that was the premise of slavery.
You could not protest the existence or treatment of slaves on the
plantation because that was private and
therefore outside your right to be concerned.” (Jesse
Jackson, 1977)
Of
course, it is quickly pointed out how not allowing abortion would
adversely effect women who were raped. I acknowledge that not
allowing abortion in cases of rape would effect these women
adversely. Not as adversely as the rape itself. And not as adversely
as the abortion will effect the baby. But it would mean serious,
undeserved consequences for the mother.
Here
is the irony: Rape and its consequences are horrible because it is
the forced will of the powerful over the weak. What solution does the
pro-choice movement suggest? More forced will of the powerful (now
the pressuring family and/or pregnant mother) over the powerless (the
baby). So as painfully difficult as even this issue is, it is only
compounding the crime.
That
said, only 1% of abortions are the result of rape. The pro-choice
movement makes this issue sound like it is a huge number of
abortions. Another 12% are for the vague category of health reasons.1
The rest are because of inconveniences caused by the baby. Sometimes
difficult inconveniences, including fear, guilt, or shame, but
inconveniences nonetheless. Why do
wife abusers beat their wives? The lame reasons given might include
that they didn't like the way they were spoken to, or the temperature
of dinner, or some other inconvenience. At the end of the day,
they do it because they can. They do it because they are stronger and
can force their will upon the weaker partner.
Legalized
abortion is legalized abuse and oppression. God
has never supported the oppressor. God does not condone abuse.
Therefore, God could never support the
pro-choice mindset of protecting the powerful over the weak.
All the excuses aside, that is
what it is. Don't get me wrong,
racists were always able to make a reasonable sounding case in the
world they lived. Even antisemitism was attractive to enough people
to allow Hitler to hold office. Hindsight has much greater clarity.
Consider
the following:
Amongst
“six things the LORD hates, seven that are detestable to him” are
“haughty eyes, a lying tongue, hands that shed innocent
blood…” (Proverbs
6:16-19)
“3For
your hands are stained with blood, your fingers
with guilt. …4No one calls for justice;
no one pleads his case with integrity. They rely on empty
arguments and speak lies; they conceive trouble and give
birth to evil. …7Their feet rush into sin;
they are swift to shed innocent blood.”
(Isaiah 59:3-7)
Do
no wrong or violence to the alien, the fatherless or
the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place.
(Jeremiah
22:3)
The
empty arguments of the pro-choice movement are the same empty
arguments abusers and oppressors have been using for millennia. I
close with a quote from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s niece.
We
have been fueled by the fire of “women’s rights,” so long that
we have become deaf to the outcry of the real victims whose rights
are being trampled upon, the babies and the mothers. . . . Oh, God,
what would Martin Luther King, Jr., who dreamed of having his
children judged by the content of their characters do if he’d lived
to see the contents of thousands of children’s skulls emptied into
the bottomless caverns of the abortionists pits? (D.
Dr. Alveda King)
Love
the Gospel, Live the Gospel, Advance the Gospel,
Jerry
