I find the current political dialogue disheartening. It seems like we’re all being forced to identify as either Democrats or Republicans, and if we dare to conform by labeling ourselves as one or the other, we have to take all the garbage that goes along with it. Americans want to label everything and everyone, and I find all the labeling unproductive. It only leads to name-calling and finger-pointing.
Putting politics aside, then, I want to talk about what it means to be a pro-life Christian. One conviction to which I hold closely is that all life is God-ordained and that each human being bears the unique image of God. A repercussion of this belief is that I am pro-life, meaning that I am anti-abortion, anti-capital-punishment, and anti-euthanasia, physician-assisted or otherwise.
While taking the risk that those statements may offend one or many of my readers, I want to stress that the most important issues are often the most controversial. I do not wish to step on the toes of those who support abortion rights. Instead, want to point out that people (especially Christians) who call themselves pro-life and yet enthusiastically support the death penalty or bombing the you-know-what out of our enemies should consider whether they’re really pro-life or just anti-abortion.
Believing that God is the one who ordains, sustains, and values His created beings, I struggle with my beliefs about capital punishment and the purpose and extent of war. As a Christian, one of my greatest challenges is to navigate the political sphere while balancing my convictions against the practical realities and complexities of the world. From economics to border control, I find it almost impossible to make definitive statements about some of the hardest issues because there is simply more than just one side to every story.
For example, one of the arguments I’ve heard about the death penalty is whether or not taxpayers should be burdened with feeding and housing the murders and the rapists in prison. Even so, I think Jesus makes it clear that casting stones is not one of our options. Discussions about the convenience of a life are not on the table.
The man on death row, the unborn baby, the terrified North or South Korean citizen hearing threats about the size of our nuclear button—all these people have something in common. God made each one, God extends mercy to each one, and He commands us to love each and every neighbor as ourselves.
Regardless of how much political sense our Biblical convictions make, Christians shouldn’t be the ones eager to point fingers at abortion clinics and then drop bombs on defenseless civilians without batting an eye. I’m sure this makes many readers uncomfortable and defensive, but I still think it’s a truth worth bringing to our attention.
Here’s the simple reality that we need to acknowledge: being pro-life is about more than being anti-abortion. It’s about being a voice for the defenseless and refusing to end lives simply because they’re inconvenient, whether they’re born or unborn.
As Dean Jordan graciously challenged us last week in chapel, we need to be brave enough to ask really hard and uncomfortable questions. We need to be humble enough to entertain thoughts that may reveal that we’re wrong. We need to trust that being wrong is worth it if it means loving the way Jesus loves and changing our lives to more closely resemble the one he modeled for us.
Being pro-life is about so much more than being anti-abortion. It’s about recognizing that black, white, male, and female lives matter. I don’t say “all lives matter” because I think black or white lives are unimportant, but because the unborn, the enslaved, the oppressed, the imprisoned, and even the inconvenient person is loved by God. Our sinful inability to recognize people as valuable and treat them as such does not mean that they are not to be treasured. My challenge to each of you is to consider what it means to be pro-life, and what you can do to defend those who cannot defend themselves.
Angela is a first-year student majoring in writing and psychology.