Every life is a valuable miracle, and it’s God’s involvement in life that gives it direction and purpose.
For example, when God talked to the prophet Jeremiah about the task for which he had been made, God told him, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations” (Jeremiah 1:5).
This verse affirms the foresight of God for each of us and the value He places on each individual human—a value he assigns to no other living species, thus elevating man above animals.
In a recent PragerU video, Will Witt presented people on the street with two petitions. One was to save baby eagles, which was quickly signed by all. The other was to stop the killing of humans, which was also enthusiastically received—until the words “anti-abortion” were added. Young progressives froze as that buzzword brought them to a halt.
The selfishness of our society was nowhere more keenly illustrated than when one bleach-blonde twenty-something blurted, “Babies are gross!”, showing the same physical repulsion as a child who refuses to touch a dead worm. When Witt told another woman who signed the eagle petition that “We wanna protect [unborn children’s] rights, too,” she responded, “Wait! No! I don’t agree with that!”[1]
To put it bluntly, she disagrees with protecting the most basic of all human rights—the right to live—the right to be born. That fundamental right has been so redefined in recent years that nearly half of all Americans now consider themselves “pro-choice,”[2] meaning they want to rob unborn children of their ability to make any choice, ever.
Not just Christians care about unborn life but many atheists do as well. Some 19% of atheists identify as pro-life. [3] As famous atheist Christopher Hitchens affirms, “the unborn entity has a right [to life] on its side and every effort should be made to see that it is preserved.”[4]
There is no rational reason to couch abortion in terms of “women’s rights.” In fact, pro-life feminists such as Frederica Mathewes-Green see “pro-choice” arguments as often being made from a position of fear—a fear of, and a desire to avoid pregnancy. She suggests that many women, finding themselves with an unwanted pregnancy, “wants an abortion as an animal, caught in a trap, wants to gnaw off its own leg.”[5] Of course, the solution for this fear is not more abortions but rather better support and resources for the women who do experience unwanted pregnancies, thus allowing them to carry the child to term without the mother believing she is throwing away her own hopes and dreams.
The good news is that the number of abortions performed annually has been on the decline for the past few decades.[6] But in the meantime, we still need to confront this issue head-on and defend the rights of the unborn. After all, they are human, their life is ordained by God, and we should therefore defend their fundamental God-given inalienable rights, which begins with the right to be born.
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[1] PragerU, “Is an Eagle Egg More Valuable Than a Baby?,” YouTube (September 4, 2019), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZR9Ye_Uk-x8
[2] “Abortion,” Gallup (May 2019), https://news.gallup.com/poll/1576/abortion.aspx
[3] Hemant Mehta, “Yes, There Are Pro-Life Atheists Out There. Here’s Why I’m One of Them,” Friendly Atheist (March 11, 2014), https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2014/03/11/yes-there-are-pro-life-atheists-out-there-heres-why-im-one-of-them/
[4] Melvin Olontha, “Hitchens: Humanism and abortion,” YouTube (October 22, 2008), https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B8HhTKzmvas
[5] Frederica Mathewes-Green, “When Abortion Suddenly Stopped Making Sense,” National Review (January 22, 2016), https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/01/abortion-roe-v-wade-unborn-children-women-feminism-march-life/
[6] “Historical abortion statistics, United States,” Johnston’s Archive (August 17, 2019), http://www.johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-unitedstates.html
