With Roe overturned, will evangelicals miss the chance to do good? | Opinion
Reactions to the ruling by the Supreme Court that overturned Roe v. Wade have ranged from protest demonstrations (“Hands off my body!”) to celebrations (“Hands off unborn babies!”). There has been anger. Marches. Threats. Disrupted friendships. And more political rhetoric and posturing. Some of the harshest rhetoric may even have come from “evangelicals” – a term that does not always seem to equate to “Christians.”
Some on the left might berate and blame their opposites for imposing their strict beliefs on people who do not share them. “You are as bad as the Taliban!” they will scream. “You are forcing people to live by your rules and taking away their personal freedoms. We’re going into the streets to demonstrate against what you have done!”
From the right, the retort might come, “We’re just putting an end to the murder of the helpless unborn. You have used a wrong-headed decision for decades now to set aside principle and compassion in favor of selfishness. We’re taking to the streets to celebrate an end to your moral irresponsibility!”
These things – and possibly much worse – may happen. I can’t stop them. But I can hope for something better. As someone who opposes on-demand access to abortion as an alternate form of birth control, a means to sex selection or simply as a convenience, I could wish for something more restrained, reasoned and responsible.
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I suspect most all Americans – regardless of their religion, politics or life situation – think abortion is less than ideal. That fewer abortions are better than more. That, in an ideal world, there would be none at all. And that something positive is better as a response than shrieking and throwing stones – whether rhetorical or actual.
On the assumption that this court ruling will result in fewer abortions – an assumption that may or may not be correct – I hope the pastors and churches that have been at the forefront of opposition to abortion will step up now to help frightened young women. Be a safe place for them to come for help. Provide resources to the ones who choose to keep their babies and help them complete their own educations.
If your church, your pastor or you encourage a woman to keep her baby rather than abort the child, you are asking her to accept a huge moral responsibility, a major financial liability and a commitment to her child’s lifetime of physical, emotional and spiritual challenges. It is not fair to urge all that on a woman without being willing to step up to help her.
Christians of the 2nd and 3rd centuries impressed their pagan neighbors who practiced infanticide without shame by rescuing abandoned children, taking care of them, educating them and launching them into adult life and jobs. They “demonstrated” with love – not with stones and obscene taunts.
I hope the dust will settle soon so all people of goodwill in our own troubled time can help women with their unwanted pregnancies, help them receive and nurture their children as precious, perhaps take some of those children into our own homes when their mothers can’t, and help give those babies the nurturing every child needs.
This is no time for a “victory lap” for anyone who thinks she or he has won the abortion battle in an ongoing culture war. With a topic this sensitive, that simply looks mean-spirited.
This is an opportunity to show compassion and to put the support and resources in place that will let women with unplanned pregnancies move ahead with their lives so as to welcome and nurture their babies.
Rubel Shelly is a philosopher-theologian who has taught medical ethics for four decades.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: With Roe overturned, will evangelicals miss the chance to do good?
