Abortion
Abortion
is a made up issue designed to coalesce a right-wing political
movement.
It isn’t even mentioned in the Bible unless you consider the
obvious implications of the ordeal of the bitter water in Numbers 5.
Everyone
has a right to make their own decisions about abortion and we believe
if someone is against it they shouldn't have one.
No one has the right
to impose their beliefs on this topic on others, especially when
right-wing Biblical interpretations are fabricated for political
purposes.
Most conservative "Christians" won't read won't read any further than this.
They just can't handle hearing something that could bring down their
entire psychological house of cards.
That means it's up to us to
educate ourselves and educate those around us who will listen.
It's very interesting to note that in Jewish law and tradition an unborn fetus is not considered a person (Heb. nefesh, lit. “soul”) until it has been born.
The fetus is
regarded as a part of the mother’s body and not a separate being until
it begins to egress from the womb during parturition (childbirth).
Things haven't always been the way they are now with American Christianity.
A
1968 a symposium sponsored by the Christian Medical Society and
Christianity Today, the flagship magazine of evangelicalism, refused to
characterize abortion as sinful, citing 'individual health, family
welfare, and social responsibility' as justifications for ending a
pregnancy.
In 1973, Wallie Amos ‘W. A.’ Criswell, President of the Southern Baptist Convention from 1968 to 1970, had this to say:
“I
have always felt that it was only after a child was born and had a life
separate from its mother that it became an individual person, and it
has always, therefore, seemed to me that what is best for the mother and
for the future should be allowed."
Enter
con-man Paul Weyrich, the late religious conservative political
activist, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation, and Godfather of The
“Christian” Right, who literally shopped various issues trying to
galvanize a conservative “Christian” movement.
His hypothetical
“moral majority” needed a catalyst—a standard around which to rally.
For nearly two decades, Weyrich, by his own account, had been trying
out different issues, hoping one might pique evangelical interest:
pornography, prayer in schools, the proposed Equal Rights Amendment to
the Constitution, even abortion.
“I was trying to get these people
interested in those issues and I utterly failed,” Weyrich recalled at a
conference in 1990.
The 1978 Senate races demonstrated to
Weyrich and others that abortion might motivate conservatives where it
hadn’t in the past.
He saw his opening and he never looked back.
He and his buddies Francis Schaeffer, Jerry Falwell, Richard Viguerie, and others were off and running in the creation of The "Christian" Right.
This article in Politico explains the entire early ugly history in great detail.
It is a must read.
... As you will learn, abortion was just a ploy to rally a herd
mentality.
Bigotry was the real motivation behind the madness of Paul Weyrich and his bunch.
There are of course many other facets to this story.
Frank Schaeffer picks up where Politico left off in his book,
"Crazy
for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elect, Helped Found the Religious
Right, and Lived to Take All (or Almost All) of It Back."
Frank's book is another "must read" for seekers of the Truth.
