The most serious and divisive moral issue since black slavery tore the Republic apart in the mid nineteenth century is that of abortion. We are divided almost equally among those who oppose it and those who do not. The lines are drawn clearly. Abortion on demand has been the salient issue for feminist groups since the sixties and is a galvanizing theme among the liberals who control the Democratic Party. Opposing these are Christians who have steadfastly opposed abortion since long before it was legalized in 1962 by the dubious Supreme Court decision Roe v Wade. To them abortion is no less than the killing of innocents, a direct and monstrous violation of the Sixth Commandment prohibition of murder.
It was once argued that abortion is not infanticide because a fetus is not a person until it is born. Science and medicine have since shown irrefutably that a fetus from its earliest stages is an unborn human being. Only the most partisan abortionists deny this today. As intolerable as is slavery, it involves only the enslavement of a person, abortion on the other hand is the destruction of a person. If eradicating the former lesser offense justified the death of 500,000 Americans, how much more the latter? Our country may be on the precipice of having to answer that ominous question.
For the first time since Lyndon Johnson was President 40 years ago, Democrats have overwhelming control of both houses of Congress and the White House. During Johnson’s term, many of the Democrat legislators were southerners and most of these conservative. Today the left wing of the liberal wing of the party exerts hegemony. The Speaker of the House, the Senate Majority Leader and both President-Elect Barack Obama and Vice President-Elect Joe Biden are long time supporters of abortion on demand.
The abortionist lobby, in anticipation of a friendly reception from the new regime has submitted a fifty page, pro-abortion program involving more than a billion dollars in public funds. Among the recommendations are $65 billion for UNFPA a United Nations family planning group that promotes abortion in the third world. $700million for grants to pro-abortion clinics and organizations such as Planned Parenthood andthe repeal of the Hyde Amendment that limits Medicaid from funding abortions except in cases of rape, incest or when the mother’s life is in danger. Obama has been a vocal opponent of Hyde and can be expected to support its repeal. In addition, the proposal asks the new President to sign an executive order repealing the Mexico City Policy that prohibits non-governmental-organizations like the UN from using US funds to finance abortion overseas. The most odious of the demands is that funding for abortion become a part of the mandatory national health insurance scheme supported by the left. President Obama is drifting right on the environment and the economy. He must give the left something of significance or risk losing his base; that thing is likely to be abortion on demand with all its attendant sorrows.
Heretofore what little use of public money for abortion has been hidden, quiet, and abroad. Abortion opponents have chosen to turn a blind eye toward it. If the above proposals become law, they - particularly Christians - will not be able to ignore it. Believers will be put to the ancient test. How will they respond when the power of government demands they pay for an activity that so grossly offends their true Sovereign?
Christians are by faith and habit quiet people. Not only are they about peacefully worshiping their Lord and raising families; they are commanded to obey their government - or civil magistrate - as an instrument of God for policing society. There are only two exceptions to this mandate, when the magistrate forbids something The Lord requires and when the magistrate commands something The Lord forbids. The question before The Church is to be; in using one's tax money to fund the killing of innocents, does the magistrate command the believer to participate in what The Lord forbids?. For the only time in our nation’s history, individual believers will have to decide whether to obey Caesar or God. The consequences of that decision are grave for the Christian, The Church and the nation.
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