Michael Spencer: Humanly Speaking: The Evil of Abortion, the Silence of the Church, and the Grace of God. Colorado Springs: Believers Book Services, 2021.
Peter Singer: Practical Ethics. Third edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Chapter 6: “Taking Life: The Embryo and the Fetus.”
Writing first of all to Christian pastors, Spencer remarks that “the Church in America has largely abandoned the unborn.” Pastors fear to preach against abortion, lest they offend their own flocks. But they should know that the Church can “be a thunderous, protective voice for the unborn threatened by abortion while at the same time a grace-extending community for those who have had abortions or been responsible for them.” As Edmund Burke might say, sublimity may offend but beauty can soothe, and Christian love animates both.
“Abortion is the intentional and unjust killing of innocent unborn human beings.” The injustice of abortion inheres in the innocence of the unborn, which can hardly be disputed, and their humanity, which is. Former Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards asserts that “for me,” the life of her three children “began when I delivered them.” Except that we know it didn’t, even for her, inasmuch as her children made their presence known to her long before their births. “An objective understanding of our biological beginnings cannot be formulated by relying on subjective tests or wishful thinking,” since “species membership is scientifically determined,” not “open to personal definitions or opinions.” Each human being has his or her “own unique DNA” at the moment of conception. “At this point, the sperm and egg cells essentially die to themselves, giving their constituents over to the creation of an entirely new entity or being,” a “genetically whole human being,” a zygote. All the rest is growth and development. “Emerging from the birth canal does nothing to change the human nature or intrinsic value of the one being killed, nor does being in the womb mitigate the injustice of such killing.” If anything, the zygote’s presence in the womb protects and nourishes, giving no warrant for killing.
“Nevertheless, while scientific evidence can establish when a human comes to be, it is incapable of establishing or determining human value.” After all, there have been those ready to kill millions of human beings for the sake of racial purity, victory in the class struggle, or ecological balance. Such persons often defend their actions by assuming that human goodness inheres strictly in what human beings do, not in what they are. (Alternatively, and even more lethally, they may deny that the objects of their killing are human at all.) It is undoubtedly true that what human beings do is one test of whether they deserve to die; we impose capital punishment on murderers, fight just wars on those who plan and undertake unjust, violent attacks. But the human capacity to do evil or good requires human existence. If the human nature of individuals is not good, why do we punish those who kill those who have done nothing to deserve extinction? Zygotes have done no such thing.
Some abortion-on-demand advocates argue that zygotes may be killed because they lack self-awareness. But “if self-awareness is what confers personhood status, then those who have more of it would have greater value and would be deserving of greater moral rights.” This argument, along with such criteria as level of development, environmental policy, or degree of dependency amount to attempts to excuse “the legal destruction of weak and vulnerable unborn children in the name of ‘choice’ simply because they do not measure up to the subjective tests the strong and powerful have arbitrarily established for them.” The appeal to ‘choice’ persuades primarily those who “view the unborn as an impediment to their own comfort or convenience.” The American Founders saw things differently, holding the right to life among the self-evident truths government should aim to secure. “The pro-life position holds that every living human being, at every stage of development and without qualification, has inherent moral worth and deserves legal protection”; “abortion is not wrong primarily because of what it costs us.” Rather, “it is wrong because of what it costs those who are aborted.” Christian defenders of the unborn have the additional reason given by the example of Christ, who “stretched the boundaries of our love to include outcasts, sinners, and even our persecutors”—that is, to the guilty. Why would Jesus not want us to preserve the lives of the innocent?
What, Spencer asks, does the ‘right to choose’ mean? It means the right “to destroy a human being,” since the mother’s right to bear her child isn’t being contested. Moreover, since all human beings bear God’s image, “abortion is ultimately an attack on God Himself,” the “ultimate act of vandalism against our Creator.” An atheist like the Chinese Communist tyrant Deng Xiaoping ‘limited’ families to one child each because he deemed this necessary in order to prevent population growth from “devouring” the “fruits of economic growth”—this, despite the fact that socialists typically deplore ‘putting profits over people.’ In individualistic America, the slogan instead has been, ‘My Body, My Choice,’ a formula that simultaneously “dehumanizes the unborn, deifies individual autonomy, and obliterates moral responsibility” by “grant[ing] one class of our citizenry, namely mothers, the legal right to force death on another class of our citizenry, namely their unborn sons and daughters.” The claim that laws prohibiting abortion would ‘force’ pregnant women to seek dangerous ‘back-alley’ abortion is absurd on its face, since no one forces them to do that. (The claim that five to ten thousand women died annually from such illegal abortion is false, as the person who fabricated it has since admitted.) As for the children of rape victims, the person who forces himself on a woman is the criminal, not the child who results from the crime. “We do not believe the violent and forceful act of rape against women justifies the violent and forceful act of abortion against unborn children.”
Pro-abortion advocates once claimed that legalized abortion would reduce the rate of child abuse. It hasn’t. And indeed the rate of child abuse has increased since the Supreme Court’s decision in the Roe v. Wade case. Pro-abortion advocates also claimed that abortions themselves would become ‘safe, legal, and rare.’ Safer for the mother, perhaps, if not for the child. Legal, yes, by definition. Rare? If anything, more frequent. Life-enhancing for the mothers who commit to the ‘choice’? Not necessarily, as the suicide rate after an abortion has been three times the general suicide rate and six times that associated with birth. As for the fathers, it has “stripped good and responsible fathers of their legal right to protect and provide for the children they helped create” while granting amnesty for bad and irresponsible fathers who want to get out of child support.
“Christians who remain indifferent are dehumanized as well,” ignoring Christ’s command to love their neighbors as themselves. Such “silent pastors and dispassionate Christians have a great deal in common with the abortionist: both view unborn children as miserably inconvenient.” Such persons typically judge themselves to be decent sorts. But why should “those who stand by idly in the face of evil deserve to be called good?”
Such Christians sometimes protest that the Bible nowhere condemns abortion. True enough, but it does condemn the murder of innocent human beings, does it not? “Since we know every human being is a member of the species Homo sapiens, and that human life begins at conception, we do not need a commandment declaring, ‘Thou shalt not murder unborn children.'” The Sixth Commandment already has that covered. Christ Himself “did not become flesh at His birth, but at His conception.” How, then, “can Christians marvel at the Incarnation and yet remain unconvinced of the full humanity or full personhood of the embryo or fetus?” “To marvel at the Incarnation while being indifferent to abortion’s victims is like worshipping Christ while siding with Herod.” In fact, “the word translated ‘baby,’ comes from the Greek word, brephos, which is used consistently by the New Testament writers to refer to babies born and unborn.” Did either Mary, mother of Jesus, or Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist, consider their unborn sons anything less than human?
Spencer enumerates six frequently heard attempts to bridle open opposition to abortion among Christians:
- ‘Abortion is a political issue, and the Church should stay out of politics.’ “But nearly every moral issue is eventually politicized, including war, slavery, and in recent years marriage.” This has actually been admitted by many feminists, who aver that ‘everything is political.’ But if so, “Jesus Christ is lord over all.
- ‘The Church should confine itself to prayer.’ Aside from the fact that people who say this “are usually the last ones to do so,” why would the Church not pray and act, as well? Pro-abortion advocates often urge the Church to become ‘activists’ when matters of ‘social justice’ are at stake.
- ‘Abortion is a women’s issue; men have no right to speak against it.’ Evidently, they have every right to speak for it, however: “This conversation-stopper is never used to silence pro-choice men.” Spencer correctly identifies this as another instance of ‘Critical Theory,’ which “argues that the lived experiences of oppressed (or seemingly oppressed) groups grant them privileged access to truth,” that “rational thought and objective facts count for nothing.” But why so? Obviously, “disqualifying nearly half the U.S. population from speaking about abortion”—or, more accurately, from speaking against it, if they so choose—because “of their gender is nothing short of sexist.” And highly convenient for those doing the disqualifying. And “in fact, pro-life women use the same arguments as pro-life men.”
- ‘At least, aborted children go to Heaven.’ So do all other murder victims.
- ‘Speaking out against abortion will turn people away from the Gospel.’ “No, it won’t,” and even if it did, that would mean that the Church should tiptoe around the Ten Commandments. Rather, “to abandon the unborn is to abandon the gospel itself”; “the pastor’s obligation is not to try to predict how someone might possibly respond so he can tailor his sermon in such a way as to guarantee no offense is taken” but rather to “trust in god’s Spirit to convict and draw people to Himself.”
- ‘Pro-lifers are angry, violent types, unworthy of association with decent folk, failing to act in a Christian manner.’ This amounts both to what logicians call a ‘hasty generalization’ and an argumentum ad hominem. Even if it were true, it would have no effect on whether abortion is right or wrong.
Instead of shirking their responsibilities, Christian pastors should lead their congregations in prayer for the unborn and their parents, teach their congregations about human dignity and equality, condemn abortion from the pulpit, and lead those who have had abortions to Jesus Christ. “Something has gone horribly wrong when a congregation cannot agree that killing unborn children is morally reprehensible,” or when pastors fail to understand that “preaching about the sin of abortion and the forgiveness offered to the guilty doesn’t interrupt the healing process, it helps it to begin.”
None of this contradicts Jesus’ command to be as prudent as serpents, along with being innocent as doves. If a pastor fails to take an honest interest in others as he speaks against abortion, he can expect them to become bored or ‘defensive.’ Agapic love is not to be suspended during abortion discussions but affirmed in them. When speaking about abortion, stick to the arguments and do not respond in kind to ad hominem attacks, or seek to humiliate your opponent in debate. Don’t be distracted by side-issues but keep the core argument in mind: it is morally wrong to intentionally kill an innocent human being; abortion intentionally kills an innocent human being; therefore, abortion is wrong. Don’t test the patience of the one listening to you by rattling on. And bear in mind that the world is watching you. You may eschew ad hominem debates, but your adversaries will not. Give them a small target by your conduct and the tone of your conversation.
“The American Church is producing a listless, shallow generation” because Christian children, like those of non-Christians, are left to be “ruled by feelings” while “feeling nothing for others.” Snapping ‘selfies’ doesn’t amount to much as a ‘lifestyle choice.’ Life is more than just styling, and it’s up to the Church to show why this is so.
Peter Singer is hardly concerned with the American Church or any other religious institution. He does acknowledge “the central argument against abortion,” as stated by Spencer and many others: It is wrong to kill an innocent human being; a human fetus is an innocent human being; therefore, it is wrong to kill a human fetus. The pro-abortion debaters usually deny the second premise, claiming that a fetus isn’t human. Singer, however, concedes that there is no “morally significant dividing line” between “the fertilized egg and child.” “The conservative”—his term for persons opposed to on-demand abortion—stands “on solid ground in insisting that the development from the embryo to the infant is a gradual process, not marked by any obvious point at which there is a change in moral status sufficient to justify the difference between regarding the killing of an infant as murder and the killing of a fetus as something that a pregnant woman should be free to choose as she wishes.”
To vindicate abortion rights, Singer instead denies the first premise, that it is wrong to kill an innocent human being. And it is indeed true that many just-war theorists will not condemn the killing of innocents when such killing attends the destruction of a military target that is crucial to the enemy’s war-making capacity; for example, a pregnant woman and her unborn child might die during the bombing of a military factory in which she is working, having been conscripted. Singer rightly avoids that analogy, since a just war is a war in self-defense, whereas only an abortion done to save the life of the mother could be so understood. He instead criticizes the first premise for relying “on our acceptance of the special status of human life.” Drawing the distinction between ‘human’ as Homo sapiens —a member of the human species—and ‘human’ as a person—a “rational or self-conscious” being—he first observes that an unborn human being lacks personhood. To abort a fetus is to kill a human but not to kill a person. As for killing an innocent member of the human species who is not yet a person, how does that differ morally from killing a cow or a pig? “Whether a being is or is not a member of our species is, in itself, no more relevant to the wrongness of killing it than whether it is or is not a member of our race.” The only morally relevant consideration is the avoidance of pain, or perhaps of needless pain. “The belief that mere membership of our species, irrespective of other characteristics”—such as the ability to feel pain—is “a legacy of religious doctrines that even those opposed to abortion hesitate to bring into the debate,” Heaven forfend. It is “a biased concern for the members of our own species.”
Singer does not hesitate to draw a (false) conclusion: Infants are pre-rational, if not pre-conscious. Humane (i.e., painless) infanticide is therefore permissible. And it was a common practice in pre-Christian times, “practiced in societies ranging geographically from Tahiti to Greenland and varying in culture from nomadic Australian aborigines to the sophisticated urban communities of ancient Greece or mandarin China or Japan before the late nineteenth century.” More, under some of these regimes “infanticide was not merely permitted but, in circumstances, deemed morally obligatory,” as killing “a deformed or sickly infant” relieved families and communities from serious burdens. True enough, but if avoidance of pain is the criterion which limits the right to kill, this should mean that abortion is wrong the moment the fetus can feel pain.
Singer would be the first to admit (well, in this instance maybe not the first, but among those to) that customs do not rightly determine moral principles. His argument therefore depends upon his claim that we have no moral call to ‘privilege’ our own species over others, to spare the life of a human fetus only because it is innocent (being a fetus) and one of us (being human). But why is this a “bias”? That is, why is it unreasonable? Is ‘speciesism’ wrong?
Ethics aims at what is good for all things, necessarily beginning with ‘the human things,’ inasmuch as among the natural species only human beings inquire into what the good is and what the right means to obtain it are. Absent divine commands (and going along with Singer’s insistence that we ignore them, for the sake of the argument), we can only start our inquiry and deliberations ‘where we are,’ that is, as the only species we know of that is capable of this sort of complex reasoning. This doesn’t mean that human beings ought to be unconcerned about the good for other species, ‘the planet,’ and even nature as a whole. John Locke observes, and deplores, boys’ propensity to torture small animals, and he intends his education to bridle such impulses, among others. He is primarily concerned with the effect of such behavior, if habitual, on boys. But there is no reason why he might not deplore its effect on the animals, too.
The question then arises whether slaughtering animals for food or other human purposes, if done while inflicting minimal pain or no pain, is on a par with slaughtering human fetuses while inflicting minimal pain or no pain—say, at an early stage of their development. The Bible clearly teaches that animals may be slaughtered or enslaved humanely, as God gives Man sovereignty over them while insisting (for example) that men not yoke together oxen of unequal strength. Is that divine teaching in favor of ‘speciesism’ rationally justifiable?
It is, because the sovereignty of man over other species is an ineluctable fact of nature as a whole—or, to be cautious about the possibility of ‘intelligent life’ in other nooks of the universe, the earth. It is the nature of human beings to be capable of ruling the other animals because human beings by nature are smarter than they are. This gives human beings the authority, and with it the responsibility, to rule the earth for the human good first and foremost, as all rulers in all regimes rule others first and foremost. That is, the ‘is’ of human power brings with it the ‘ought’ of human rule. They must rule reasonably, according to natural right, but rule they must, by nature. Ruling ‘humanely’ means to rule in accordance with their nature—reasonably, not tyrannically—but surely aiming at the good of themselves, first and foremost.
The consequence of this for the abortion dispute is that Singer’s argument in favor of abortion, based on his charge of ‘speciesism,’ really makes little sense. This leaves inviolate Spencer’s argument, even with its religious dimension excised.
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