Abortion: what is the church’s responsibility?

Interviews conducted by Erica Fehr

To address the topic of abortion, several women leaders of the EMC were asked about their views. Some provided written responses to key questions, and some were interviewed through video conference. One of the questions pertained to abortion in the church. Statistics show that the abortion rate among women attending church is very similar to that of women outside of the church. (Source) This surprised some, but not all of the women who spoke to us because their experience lined up with the statistic. We asked why they thought this could be when our message has consistently been that abortion is wrong. When it comes to the responsibility of the church, several key themes emerged.

The church’s teaching on the value of life

While the beginning of life isn’t specifically addressed in Scripture, several respondents referred to Psalm 139:13ff, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.” For believers, this demonstrates that God is involved in and values each human life from his or her beginnings in the womb.

Scripture also clearly states that humanity is created in God’s image. Says one respondent, “I believe in the sanctity of life from conception to natural death. Every person is made in the image of God and is valuable solely because of that.”

However, several women who spoke to us stressed that concern for the unborn couldn’t be separated from a robust view of the value and dignity of all human life. “Caring for vulnerable life…needs to include those who are older…those already born,” says one respondent. Another says, “Enabled by the Spirit, the church is to affirm and act in ways that value life at every stage and ability.”

Although everyone who spoke to us placed high value on the life of unborn children, several people pointed out the church faces a quandary in stating that “life starts at conception” while responding differently to miscarriage (we don’t hold a funeral in the case of a miscarriage). “Growing up, I didn't hear the church talk about miscarriage at all,” says one respondent. Another says, “In general, society, including Christians, responds to miscarriage differently than we respond to an infant's death—there is a difference. When we don’t acknowledge complexity or the exceptions/weaknesses in our beliefs, we lose integrity in the ‘debate.’”

We need to celebrate life, however it arrives

If we can’t “embrace joy as a church if someone experiences an unexpected pregnancy” we shouldn’t be “surprised that abortion exists readily within our church walls,” says a respondent. She told of her devastation when a Christian teen she was mentoring got pregnant. When she shared her grief with her ministry director, he responded with “Praise God!” He reminded her that “pregnancy is not a sin, no matter what the circumstances, but always a blessing,” citing Psalm 127:3. As we teach on the sanctity of life, is abortion simply a “‘do not’ issue, or is it shared from the value of life, the blessing of a child, and the joy of God creating life?”

Even married women can feel like the church is not a safe place to air conflicted feelings about an unplanned pregnancy. “I think there's still just tons of stigma in the church around unplanned pregnancies,” says one woman. “Maybe,” she says, “We need to start talking more in our churches about how beautiful and how good children are and how beautiful and how good family life can be.”

We need to acknowledge self-sacrifice in a Christian’s calling

As Christians, we are called to a life of self-sacrifice. This is completely counter to our culture’s message of “me, me, me,” or “the pursuit of personal freedom” above all else.

“As followers of Christ,” one respondent puts it, “we believe in something very radical—that God intends to overcome evil with good and that self-sacrifice is the way to win over violence… Believers have joined a different kingdom, choosing to trust that in laying down our lives we will actually find abundant life.” The church has a role to remind our culture, with its continuing value for hero stories, “that we value the pursuit of courageous self-sacrifice more than the pursuit of personal freedom. And that we all understand that love always involves the choice to give up some of our personal freedom.”

One respondent referred to the act of giving life to another as “be[ing] at an obedience crossroads.” Says another, “When pregnancy threatens to completely destroy the life we were pursuing, our faith is tested.” Yet another describes how “when a woman chooses to give life to another person…that is going to take your own life away. If you are going to care for that child, your own life will from then on in many ways be second.”

“Choosing the way of Christ is always hard. It always involves a cross, and our human nature doesn’t want that… We have a hard time believing that the rewards will be greater than the consequences or the sacrifices… Maybe we need to spend more time talking about the rewards, talking about the good things, talking about the beauty. Maybe we need to spend more time building this culture of how good it is to walk in the ways of the Lord.”

We need to teach Christian sexual ethics

One respondent describes how a new Christian “had no clue that it was kind of a Christian stance that you would not live together before you were married… I think we need to be careful as churches. What are the assumptions we’re making?”

A woman who works with youth expressed concern about “what youth and others are concluding about their stance on issues such as abortion and whether it will be based on the Bible.”

One of the respondents we spoke to related her own story “I grew up quite sheltered in an EMC church and a wonderful Christian family [but] my first exposure to the concept of abortion was secular. My parents and church had been silent on the topic…very foreign to them I guess. So I accepted the current science version I encountered in my teens, which was reinforced at university, and gradually changed my mind over the years to the position I hold now, which is prolife!”

One respondent describes the need for Christian families to teach about sexual purity. “I think our families, our Christian families have…defaulted and hoped the church would somehow teach something [about sexual purity]. It's like no. Actually, it’s up to the Christian homes.”

But without shame and with compassion

“Women have received a disproportionate share of the blame for pregnancy outside of marriage,” says one respondent. “Growing up, there's so much responsibility of sexual purity and just sexual boundaries and everything in general that falls on the woman.”

When facing a pregnancy outside of marriage, for Christian women “a common feeling would be that the people in their church would never understand. And they feel it would destroy their Christian witness. So, they might feel that to abort in silence would be an easier choice rather than to face the shame.”

This sentiment was repeated in nearly every response. Said another way, “The message ‘abortion is wrong’ paired with a consistent and large emphasis on ‘sex before marriage or getting pregnant before marriage is wrong’ don’t pair well. So does a person who committed the latter of those statements want to face the shame in having a child then out of wedlock or would they rather deal with (most likely in private) the first of the two wrongs and get an abortion so people don't know about what they did?”

A respondent who has worked in a crisis pregnancy centre said that often Christian women “were more scared of facing the condemnation of the people in their church for getting pregnant than they were scared of what God would think if they had an abortion.” The church hasn’t “learned how to envelope ‘sinners’ back and that they still belong,” says another.

Says another, “We need the power and love of Christ to abound ever so abundantly in our lives as we think about how to address this topic and respond based on our belief and understanding of Scripture as a whole.”

What’s the alternative to shame? Here’s one parent’s gracious response through the story of her daughter: “When I was a rebellious teen, I haughtily told my mom that if I ever got pregnant, I would keep the baby and raise it by myself. Her response was that I would not have to. They (my parents) would help me. To this day her response gives me peace and reminds me of God’s love for us. I think it also kept me from being more rebellious than I was.”

Don’t underestimate the enemy

A couple of respondents describe the need to be aware of the enemy’s plan. “He wants death,” says one. “I’ve had pastors’ daughters…[say], ‘Not a chance. This is going to destroy my dad’s ministry’…that is such a big lie of the enemy… You don’t carry the church on your shoulders.”

Says another, the words our culture uses currently, such as “products of conception” and “reproductive rights…[are] very clean words. I would compare it when the Bible talks about Satan coming disguised as an angel of light. The words make it sound so beautiful and empowering. We’re lying to ourselves.”

The “way to come forward is when the church is “free and willing to talk about shameful things… When we say things out loud, the devil’s power is broken in a way that it isn’t when we just keep it quiet.”

Can the church be activist without destroying our witness?

Respondents differ somewhat on this point. One respondent says we should “not be so concerned about where our taxes go. Jesus said let Caesar have it and he knew Caesar was not into saving lives.”

Some respondents feel Christians should not be imposing our moral and value system on non-believers “especially when we who are Christ followers can’t even get it right,” says one. Another respondent says she fears that “by the church putting a stamp on it we have ostracized women struggling…and it’ll be harder to spread the love of Jesus. It’s not clear that there will actually be fewer abortions.”

“I think,” said another, “we need to be less concerned about keeping our complex lists of what is right and wrong, and more concerned with the pursuit of sacrificial obedience, of having the kind of love that Jesus has...and modelling the truth of our value for life in how we treat the many lives around us.”

Still others were concerned about the polarization they were seeing and the deep hurt it was causing. “I have sat at the table in conversation with single women, married women, and single friends and heard their perspectives with continued differences in their stance on the abortion issue. I suppose what surprises me most, is it seems we still have a hard time hearing the different sides. There is a lot of passion in the conversation, and a lot of hurt—deep, deep hurt from all sides. I am concerned for the lives of the children whose existence is being threatened and I am equally concerned for the rest of society and the divides we cause.”

On the other side, “I am pro-life, but I have allowed others to be the passionate, frontline force. The Roe v Wade overturn humbled my heart to confess my passivity. It is not about measurable results, but about obedience to the Word of God about human life.”

In Canada, “the current government is threatening to close all crisis pregnancy centres (CPCs) by revoking the charitable status of these organizations. [Source] The US Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe vs Wade has heightened these threats. The work that is being done at the CPCs across Canada is not only to walk alongside women during their pregnancies, but in very practical ways to walk with them after baby is born…providing clothing, formula, baby food, and parenting and support groups. If the government is successful, who will care for these women and their babies?”

It can be tough, especially for young people to take a “stance against abortion,” says one respondent. “You almost immediately get put in a position where others most likely will view you in a bad light… Many youth and others might [find it] easier to take the side that the majority of people are taking so not to stand out or be controversial.” Says another, “Many younger girls are growing up in the world of strong social media influence… Many young Christian girls these days are bombarded with messages and information that they need to be pro-choice [or] you are obviously anti-woman. Our young people need to be taught to stop and critically think about what they are seeing rather than just jumping on the next cool social bandwagon.”

Providing practical help for parents

Several of the women who spoke with us stressed the importance of church support for single women who choose to keep their baby. If the church is to model Jesus, we see he “promoted social care as the true way, the cup of water, the prison visiting…not pointing fingers about why they are there,” says one respondent. An example provided by another woman who spoke to us was that a single woman expecting a baby often wouldn’t get a baby shower or is treated differently than a woman who has a baby outside of a marriage.”     

“I think Christians need to be very careful that they’re not too loud about shutting down abortion when they’re not willing to care for single moms or to foster kids,” said another respondent, “because I feel like they go hand in hand.” Another woman spoke similarly and added that “a life saved before birth will need continued community support and care for decades after birth.”

Several women who spoke to us expressed confidence there were people in the church who had both the heart and the means to pitch in. Since many abortions happen for financial reasons “there’s something that can be done… If you think of the cost raising a child…and we have people that are willing to [help with] that, I wonder how things might be different.”

Some had stories of the church providing the care that was needed. “When a young woman in our lives found herself in an unwanted pregnancy, God gave our church the opportunity to be the supportive community that gave her courage to choose parenthood, even though in the past she had chosen abortion, seeing no alternative.”

The church needs to listen and provide care for post-abortive women

“What if someone has had an abortion,” asks one respondent, “and now we’re in church… If you’re living in the Christian story, the grace is already there holding us, even as we’re discovering that we’re broken.”

The church can be there “extending the grace of God, no matter what her choice is,” says another. “I am saddened that many in the church are not responding as Jesus would.” Another respondent echoes this saying, “our mandate is not to judge the world for the sin, but to bring them to the cross and let Jesus cleanse and restore the lost.”

One respondent describes how the church has often had a “hard stance on the topic of abortion as the most grievous of sins in the world. I know of some ladies…that have gone through amazing healing stories of forgiveness and self-acceptance after having had abortions. Grace is not limited to only certain sins.”

Compassion toward those grieving an abortion is important. One respondent talks of the need to articulate that “Jesus cried with you, and he understood your confusion and your pain…you have not lost status with Jesus.”

The church can play a role in helping people feel less alone, says one respondent. “We should hear women who’ve had abortions tell their stories,” she says. “We should hear men whose girlfriends have had abortions tell their stories. We should have people who've had unplanned pregnancies and chose to carry to term share their stories. I think those are stories we need to hear.”

“If we as a church are going to stand and say abortion is wrong,” says one respondent, “then we also need to be a place for women to feel like they have the support to carry through with their pregnancy. We have to do better in giving women other options because for someone to feel like their only option is to end the life of their baby…that’s not an option, right? That’s not a choice, right?”